As I work on accumulating
Brush Miles (or Practicing Presence?)
I feel like I’m getting continual lessons in letting go of expectation, embracing beginner’s mind, and non-attachment. Part of me cringes every time I see my child-like paintings. What I create is so different from what I imagine in my mind’s eye.
Take this landscape for example. A week ago I photographed one of my favorite scenes at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum. I loved the deep blue sky, the golds in the prairie, and the way the big lone oak tree on the ridge stood out against the bright blue sky.
I printed out a large photo of the image and made a tracing of the primary shapes in it, leaving out parts that I didn’t think I would want in my painting.
Then I sat down to do a color study for the painting. At least that was my plan.
After laying down a nice wash of blue for the skies, I became curious about whether I could remove some of the paint with a somewhat dry brush to create the appearance of clouds. I found them interesting so I left them there. As I painted the gold prairie background it bled into the sky more than I had intended. I was disappointed.
The trance of judgment
At that point I had forgotten that this was to be a simple color study and I was off to the races determined to create a painting that looked like the photo it was based on (even though I had already added clouds to the cloudless sky of the original photo). I viewed the paint bleeds into the sky as mistakes instead of learning opportunities to learn about how paint flows.
I let the painting dry thoroughly and walked away from the painting. When I went back to it later I loved it just as it was. The bright colors and simplicity spoke to me.
This morning when I went back to the painting, I still loved the simple colors that I had painted yesterday. It was hard to pick up a brush to continue the painting because I was afraid of “ruining” it. (Yes, it had morphed completely from color study to painting in my mind)
After a stern talk with myself about putting on brush miles, I sat down to paint. Sigh. I was so caught up in worrying about how it might turn out that I forgot to simply enjoy the process of painting. The result was not what I had hoped it would be.
Joy School Dojo
As I write I realize that that is okay with me. Today’s painting experience taught me about how attachment and expectation take me out of joy. It also taught me that when I “try hard” instead of approaching with a sense of exploration and adventure I’m sure to be disappointed and unhappy with the experience and with my results. I’m going to paint this scene again and again in different ways on different sizes of paper and explore to find all that I can learn from painting this scene.
“We are all just beginners here, and we shall all die beginners.”
― Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
I will be accumulating brush miles AND also practicing presence, acceptance, and non-judgment. Painting is a kind of joy school dojo for me. The joy is there to be experienced and treasured but it takes constant diligence to stay with the joy or come back to joy when I become distracted by the trance of judgment.
Don’t quit when things get interesting
“I think a lot of people quit pursuing creative lives because they’re scared of the word interesting. My favorite meditation teacher, Pema Chödrön, once said that the biggest problem she sees with people’s meditation practice is that they quit just when things are starting to get interesting. Which is to say, they quit as soon as things aren’t easy anymore, as soon as it gets painful, or boring, or agitating. They quit as soon as they see something in their minds that scares them or hurts them. So they miss the good part, the wild part, the transformative part—the part when you push past the difficulty and enter into some raw new unexplored universe within yourself. And maybe it’s like that with every important aspect of your life. Whatever it is you are pursuing, whatever it is you are seeking, whatever it is you are creating, be careful not to quit too soon. As my friend Pastor Rob Bell warns: “Don’t rush through the experiences and circumstances that have the most capacity to transform you.” Don’t let go of your courage the moment things stop being easy or rewarding. Because that moment? That’s the moment when interesting begins.”
― Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
What is your joy school dojo? What is your version of brush miles?
May you walk in beauty.
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